Her Imperial Condescension
Personality The Condesce was raised to be everything an empress 'should' be: cunning, intelligent, beautiful, and ruthless. Heiresses to the Alternian throne tend not to survive to the age where they are expected to make their own attempt at the throne without these qualities. There isn't much room for compassion or consideration; between the potential threat from the current empress and every heiress' duty to keep their lusus, Gl'bolgyb, quiet, there's hardly time for such things. When she took the throne, she became a force to be reckoned with unlike any other. She was nothing if not ambitious, and ruling Alternia on its own was never quite enough. She took to the skies as soon as she was able. Her style: lulling the planet she intended to rule into complacency, all sweet words and promises of better days, and then sending one of her many military squadrons in order to make her rule absolute. Condesce does the same with any rebellions that might pop up. She doesn't hesitate to have the Signless tortured and murdered, his best friend drafted into her service, his mother sold into slavery. The rebellion of the Summoner is far worse; she resorts to sending all trolls off-planet once they reach a certain age. Her biggest fear is losing her power. In order to keep it, she quite literally makes a deal with the devil - in return for power and immortality, she's forced to work as the emissary to Lord English, paving the way for his own reign of terror. She isn't one to show mercy or to show kindness to most trolls. Condesce spends most of her time in solitude, seeing friendship as a troll disease to be stamped out. Anyone that becomes too close to her might become a threat. The one troll she shows any affection towards at all is her Helmsman. By now, he's less a troll and more of a computer, but she trusts him. In return for his service, she 'rewards' him by extending his lifespan. But she isn't lonely, or doesn't seem to be. There's too much work to be done. Background The Peixes family has been a constant presence in the South of England for generations. While not known for being the most welcoming or the most genial family, they make up for it in their magical power - they are known for being excellent fliers and Quidditch players, brilliant at Astronomy and Arithmancy, and at least two members of the family have crossed worlds to work for the European Space Agency. While the family was initially unhappy about what they saw as a 'defection', they were able to work the contacts made to their advantage. One of these 'defectors' was Constance's mother, Gloria. Constance grew up with the best of both the Muggle world and the wizarding world. Her mother was as brilliant a scientist as she was a wizard, and through her, the little girl fell in love with the stars. She often spent nights in her mother's lab, and she became the 'little darling' of the observatory. She was making her own star charts from the time she could read them - and projecting them on her wall via magic. She often spoke about her desire to see the stars - and while they thought it was a funny joke when Constance said she wanted to rule them all, she wasn't kidding. Her grandmother, the family matriarch, didn't approve nearly so much of Constance's strong interest in 'worthless Muggle nonsense'. The elder Peixes filled the girl's head with stories of what a proper witch was like, and it was through her grandmother that her natural ambition to be the best at whatever she did was properly kindled. At her grandmother's knee, she also learned that a proper witch always had a back-up plan, was shrewd, and never lost their head. But it was in the Peixes family's large library that she first ran across a Dark spell. Being curious, she kept reading, but she made the mistake of asking her grandmother to see what the spell looked like. That got Constance a ticket to a strict boarding school in the North of England until her Hogwarts letter arrived. It didn't stop her from excelling in her studies, however, being consistently at the top of her classes. It was no surprise to anyone when Constance was sorted into Slytherin upon her entrance to Hogwarts. Most of her family had been Slytherins, and she fell into the family line all too naturally. She took to her magical studies with a vengeance, starting at the top of her classes and never falling. While she had been a friendly child, the time with her grandmother had turned her temperament considerably cooler. She had a circle of acquaintances, yes, followers, yes, but very few true friends. She had every intention of being the kind of witch her grandmother wanted her to be. Those that knew her at Hogwarts remembered how she was chosen as the Slytherin Seeker during her third year, a spot she relished. She almost seemed more at home flying over the pitch than she did in any classroom - save, of course, the Astronomy classroom. She spent hours after classes ended studying on her own, and when she wasn't on the pitch or in the observatory, she'd been spotted more than a few times in the restricted section of the library. When asked, she waved it off, claiming she was looking for old star charts. She excelled in both her OWLs and her NEWTs, and upon graduation, took a position with the Ministry of Magic, within their own Department of Astronomy. Within a few years, she was practically running the department, with a curious eye and an iron fist. While she would have been happy spending the rest of her life in her observatory, there was pressure on her to continue the family line. She took what was intended to be a mere sabbatical, but instead she spent her time observing rocket launches around the world and hoping to find a place on one of them. Constance never did see space in person, but through the course of her travels, she met an old acquaintance from her school days - Murdoc Donoghue. She was meant to be settling down with someone, and he wasn't quite ready for his impending wedding. The two of them spent several turbulent days together, and in the course of events, the two engaged in intimate relations. That was the last night they spent together. The next morning, she was on her way to Russia to watch a launch - and to discuss a potential marriage to a family acquaintance of her mother's. She came back to her laboratory a week later with an engagement ring on her finger and a surprise she didn't realize until two months later - a pregnancy. And not just any pregnancy - she found out she was carrying twins. She quickly married her Russian suitor, and seven months later, she gave birth to a pair of daughters, Meenah and Feferi. Constance never took to motherhood, though, seeing it as losing her only chance to see her beloved stars. Her children were never neglected, but they were more often than not left in the care of nannies or their grandmother. She was never openly resentful, but she was more detached from her girls than most mothers. When her husband died during a failed launch two years later, she entrusted her children to her mother's care entirely and threw herself further into her work. While she does make time to visit the girls, making sure they're doing well, even inviting them into her lab from time to time, she also keeps them at arms' length, to an extent. It isn't that she's completely heartless, but the stars are still her true love. It was a few years later when the announcement came through - there was an open position for teaching Astronomy at Hogwarts. Constance had always loved that particular observatory, and she saw it as a chance to return to that most interesting section of the library, the one she had never forgotten. The application forms were sent by owl the next morning. Relationships Feferi and Meenah Peixes Her daughters. Murdoc Donoghue Her daughters' father. It's complicated. Sybille Matteris A frenemy, of sorts, she thinks. It's complicated. Eridan Ampora Murdoc's son. The theme of complication continues. Phil Coulson A friend. It's not complicated. Maxim, Gamzee, Shinra, her students Trivia • Her wand is 11 inches, made of willow and with a dragon heartstring core. Reasonably supple. • Played by Jen See Also Journal Canon